


In Need of a Hero

by Inkribbon796



Series: Masks and Maladies [45]
Category: Jacksepticeye Fandom, Markiplier fandom - Fandom, Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Angst and Fluff, Gen, Panic Attacks, Virgil tries his best, Virgil trying to be a good guy, superhero au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-03
Updated: 2020-01-03
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:49:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,232
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22104352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inkribbon796/pseuds/Inkribbon796
Summary: Virgil just trying to be a good person, and the Host tries to help with his confidence.
Series: Masks and Maladies [45]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1538131
Comments: 4
Kudos: 55





	In Need of a Hero

Virgil hid behind Marvin, he was out on his first patrol and it was not going well. People had called the cops no less than five times.

By this point, Abe had joined them, just to stop people.

“I should just go,” Virgil decided, pulling his hood down in front of his face.

“Nah,” Marvin dismissed, then held up his hand and a bunch of rocks stopped short of hitting Virgil in the face. The anxious side yelped and huddled in on himself.

“Hey, ye dickbags!” Marvin shouted at a huddle of teenagers. “If I wanted help stonin’ the guy, I would’a asked!”

“Hey!” Abe stomped over, the teenagers bolting in different directions to avoid getting arrested. Abe was able to grab one of them after a bit of a chase.

“I shouldn’t be here,” Virgil began to panic, his fear powers starting to grab at the air around them. Marvin’s skin began to prickle, as if something was crawling underneath it. “This was a mistake. I’m so stupid, this was a mistake.”

Taking out a circular clay tablet, grabbing the front of Virgil’s coat and then crushing it in his other hand. They moved, a quick shift that the fact he had to bring someone else with him gave them both whiplash as they jumped into the base, specifically Iplier’s office.

Host was on Iplier’s table, the doctor performing a routine check-up on the seer’s eye sockets, both of them joking about something. At the two heroes’ sudden appearance, Iplier jumped.

The Host cursed in pain, but he didn’t start bleeding again.

“Ooh, sorry,” Marvin apologized as Iplier took his hands off the Host, the seer grumbling and whispering under his breath. Virgil was slowly moving to the ground where he could hug his knees to him and rock himself back and forth, trying to comfort himself. “Didn’t have time to send a warning.”

“Marvin is lucky that the Host does not hate him,” the Host grumbled.

“Doc, Virge here had a panic attack in the square, and I couldn’t just leave him there,” Marvin told him.

“I got him,” Iplier told Marvin, “thanks for bringing him over.”

Then the doctor began slowly approaching Virgil, leaving room for the Side to move back or escape in case he felt the need to. “Virgil? You’re safe.”

“I shouldn’t be out there, this is such a bad idea,” Anxiety began rocking a little. “What was I even thinking?”

“Just focus on me,” Iplier tried to calm him down. The doctor glanced back at the Host to see that the seer had turned his back to the panicking fledgeling hero, in case he looked at the Host’s empty eye sockets. “Hey, it’s just me and the Host here, no one else. Breathe in . . . breathe out.”

They sat like that for a while until Virgil slowly began to calm down. But the Side found he was exhausted, falling asleep and taking a nap on the floor for a bit. He wound up waking up with a pillow beneath his head and a hospital blanket over him.

“Anxiety should be proud of himself,” the Host spoke up, reminding Virgil that he’d been brought in while the doctor had been treating the blind man. “He is gaining more control over his powers. It took very little effort for the Host to redirect Anxiety’s powers off the doctor.”

“That’s a good thing?” Virgil asked, yawning.

“Yes,” the Host answered. “Anxiety is not fighting anyone but his own demons. A fight he was victorious in, if the Host would be so bold.”

“You always talk like that?” Anxiety stood up.

“Ever since the Host became the Host, he has been blind and an orator,” the Host answered. “It is a good change, in the Host’s mind. Or else he would not be friends with the good doctor.”

“Yeah?” Virgil picked up the pillow and the blanket. “That’s one way of thinking about it.”

“It is the  _ only _ way the Host prefers to think of it,” the seer corrected. “Any other would be a waste of his time. He cannot change his current state of being, nor go back to who he once was.”

“Who was that?” Virgil asked, more curious than he probably should have been.

“Someone whom the good doctor would have hated if they had met in person,” the Host evaded, starting to play with his own hands.

“Where’d the Doc go?” Anxiety looked around, more than a bit uncomfortable with the evasion. Mostly because Anxiety understood not wanting to answer questions about yourself.

“To get a coffee,” the Host asked. “I have a pager if you would like him to get one for you too.”

Anxiety shook his head before remembering that the Host was blind and couldn’t see him doing that. “Uh, sorry, no, I’m good. Caffeine would probably be a bad idea.”

“Perhaps,” the Host agreed.

The door to the medical room was almost kicked open as Chase stepped through with Eric in his arms. The younger hero was thrashing and screaming, covering at his eyes.“Shite, Host, please tell me Doc’s here.”

“No, the doctor is getting a coffee, was he not in the lobby?” the Host asked, getting up so Chase could set Eric down.

“No,” Chase cursed under his breath, Eric suddenly holding onto him in a death grip. “One ‘a Anti’s glitchy claws got him in the eye, an’ I don’t think he can even see what’s around ‘im. Is Schneep in?”

“Negative, he is at the hospital,” the Host answered.

Chase loudly cursed. “I don’t have time ta find the Doc, Marv an’ Jackie need me out they’re hanging on the ropes.”

“Return to them,” the Host ordered. “Anxiety and the Host will hold down the fort, so to speak.”

Anxiety felt his stomach leap into his throat.

Chase however led out a breath of relief. “I owe you man. Be right back. Eric, I gotta go, you’re here with Host and Anxiety.”

After detangling Chase, the Host sent Virgil out to look for Dr. Iplier. After a long search Virgil found him not in the kitchen but in Marvin’s library, looking at a book. Iplier seemed surprised that Virgil was awake but after telling him what had happened.

Virgil calmly let himself out of the room and back to the main room. He just started watching random stuff on Youtube for a while, distracting himself as he tried no to worry about Eric, and was failing spectacularly. Eventually, Iplier led Eric in with bandages expertly wrapped over his eyes.

“Here we go, just sit down,” Dr. Iplier gently guided him onto the couch. “Virgil’s here with you.”

“Okay,” Eric’s voice was cracked and hoarse.

“Virge, I have to go and check on the Host, he started bleeding again, will you and Eric be okay here if I leave?” Iplier just looked at Virgil, as if  _ he _ was the one in danger.

“Uh, yeah?” Virgil responded. With a cautious nod, the doctor hurried away with a quick goodbye.

Then the uncomfortable silence started.

“What are you watching?” Eric asked, reminding Virgil that the guy couldn’t see at the moment.

“Ancient Aliens,” Virgil answered. “I like laughing at the crazy stuff they talk about.”

“Silver hates that show, it’s hilarious watching him rant at it,” Eric smiled.

“So, what happened?” Virgil asked before he could stop himself.

“Uh, Anti burst out of a power box and I was in the wrong place, startled him, and I screamed,” Eric hunched in on himself and Virgil immediately felt bad for asking.

“Sorry I asked,” Virgil apologized.

“No, it’s fine,” Eric corrected nervously. “The Host said I should have my eyes back by tomorrow if I take care of them.”

“That’s lucky,” Virgil stared at Eric in shock.

“Yeah, I’m lucky he’s working for the heroes,” Eric began looking around the room, but in a slow drifting way. As if he thought Virgil was sitting somewhere else and then was getting disoriented along the way. “The Host said that King and Iplier found him after he got attacked by some villain. The guy even blinded him, I think.”

“Was it Dark?” Virgil asked, already imagining Dark and Host fighting.

“No,” Eric hunched in on himself. “But, uhm, he doesn’t talk about it a lot. I think he, uhm, would have mentioned it.”

“Right,” Virgil agreed. “Good thing they found him first then.”

“Yeah, J.J says Dark tries to get into the place once every couple of months,” Eric admitted, starting to ramble a bit. “That’s really scary since some of us live here. But I’m glad that King decided to work with us, or I don’t know what would have happened to Host.”

“King’s a good guy though, I don’t think he would have just left him on the street,” Virgil reminded nervously, a bad feeling tugging at the back of his mind.

“Yeah, but he wasn’t working for a normal street gang, he worked for Dark,” Eric was looking at the wall. “Dark doesn’t really hire people who are nice.”

“Please,” Virgil rolled his eyes. “ _ His dad _ worked for Dark, what did King really do? Egg the houses of people who kicked dogs? Compared to the guys I used to work with, you’re all saints.”

“I don’t know,” Eric admitted. “I think King said he used to work as a clerk and had to clean up the books of someone who did some really shady stuff.”

Virgil’s blood started to run cold, suddenly reminded of his deal with Dark. “What kind of stuff?”

“I don’t know, he doesn’t like talking about it,” Eric admitted, his voice faltering a few times. “But he does the heroes’ taxes now, has for several years. He’s the one who started the inventory lists that all the storage rooms have. Silver said the place was a mess before he showed up.”

Virgil got lost somewhere while Eric was talking. The anxiety that was his namesake was back, rattling the bars of his mind and screaming for attention. His mind warring with itself. Yeah he’d made that deal with Dark, but he didn’t say yes to Patton and Remy because of the deal. He’d completely forgotten about it. But if the heroes found out they wouldn’t believe him, he was a mole in their group and they’d flush him out just as effectively. His mind already dredging up the thousands of different ways that he could get found out and hurt by them.

What was he supposed to do after they threw him out? Go crawling back to Deceit? Anti would find him again. Or would the heroes just have him arrested and thrown in jail?

There was a squeak of fear and in a guilt-stricken moment, Anxiety remembered that Eric was still in the room. Trying to recover from a panic attack.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Virgil apologized desperately, trying to mentally pry the tendrils of his fear powers off Eric, who had curled into a ball and started crying. The bandages over his eyes getting a bit damp.

“I can’t see,” Eric choked out. “I can’t see anything.”

“I didn’t mean to, I’m sorry,” Virgil pleaded.

After a while Eric’s breathing seemed to calm back down, Eric lying on the couch, his back burrowed in a bit to the back of the couch. Eventually he fell back asleep, just in time for the Host to walk in.

“The Host asks if Eric is asleep or resting?” Host walked over to the fridge in the main area.

“He’s sleeping, I don’t know why you guys left him alone with me, I gave him another panic attack,” Virgil glared at him, once again surprised at how well the Host seemed to navigate through the base. “You got some weird powers that help you walk around without one of those canes?”

“Yes, the Host can see the future for brief snippets of time,” the Host admitted. “However prolonged use of the visions make the Host bleed from his eyes, so he often uses it to see for a second or two.”

“Yikes,” Virgil choked. “No wonder you have to go to Iplier all the time.”

“The Host thanks Anxiety for his help, it would have been far more difficult and damaging if the Host had been alone to help Eric.” The Host pulled what looked like a travel mug out of the fridge and walked back over.

“I don’t think I really did that much,” Virgil looked away.

“Anxiety will find that he makes more of a difference than he knows,” the Host began to walk away. “He should remember the Host can see the future.”

“Right, thanks,” Virgil smiled, trying to be optimistic. It wasn’t until the door had closed that doubt started to creep back in. That if the Host could see the future, that he probably knew about Dark, and probably knew from the moment he met Virgil.

But one look at a snoring Eric made Virgil remember that he could put the guy through nightmares on top of the guy having to be temporarily blinded and then forced through a panic. That he wasn’t a loner anymore. Virgil had actually  _ chosen _ not to be one.

So he forced himself through Logan’s breathing exercise advice, or anything else he could think of. Eventually he fell asleep too, finally peaceful for the first time in hours.


End file.
